SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 5/27/2021 10:30 AM
My Worship Time Focus:
PT-1 Intro to “Jesus’ Power over Death”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Matt.
9:18-26
Message of the verses: “18 While He was
saying these things to them, a synagogue official came and bowed down
before Him, and said, "My daughter has just died; but come and lay Your
hand on her, and she will live." 19 Jesus got up and began to
follow him, and so did His disciples. 20 And a woman who had been
suffering from a hemorrhage for twelve years, came up behind Him and touched
the fringe of His cloak; 21 for she was saying to herself, "If I only
touch His garment, I will get well." 22 But Jesus turning and seeing her
said, "Daughter, take courage; your faith has made you well." At once
the woman was made well. 23 When Jesus came into the official’s house, and saw
the flute-players and the crowd in noisy disorder, 24 He said, "Leave; for
the girl has not died, but is asleep." And they began laughing at
Him. 25 But when the crowd had been sent out, He entered and took her by the
hand, and the girl got up. 26 This news spread throughout all that land.”
I
think that it best for me to begin this SD with a quotation from John MacArthur
as he begins to introduce us to these verses in Matthew chapter nine. “Perhaps no man in modern times has seemed
before the eyes of the world to have been more at peace with himself and others
than Mahatma Gandhi. He was the image of
a tranquil soul who possessed perfect inner harmony. Fifteen years before he died he wrote, ‘I
must tell you in all humility that Hinduism as I know it entirely satisfies my
soul. It fills my whole being and I find
a solace in the Bhagavad and Upanishad that I miss even in the Sermon on the
Mount.’ But just before his death he
wrote, ‘My days are numbered. I am not
likely to live very long, perhaps a year or a little more. For the first time in fifty years I find
myself in the slew of despond.’ Even the
tranquil Gandhi had to face the reality of death and the inability of his
man-made religion to give him answers or comfort in face of it.”
Later
on he writes “We live in a dying world, where before all of us looms the
inevitability of death. We are
deteriorating human beings in a deteriorating world that is marked by tragedy,
sorrow, pain, and death. Since the fall,
there has been a curse on the earth and that curse has sent the earth and all
of its inhabitants careening and spiraling into disasters, tears, sickness, and
the grave.” (So far this SD is pretty
depressing, but I think that it will get better.)
Recently
I found out that my first wife had gotten brain cancer, and had little time to
live. I have to say that there are many
in this world who found out that their “X’s” would soon leave this earth would
be happy, as I saw on Face Book lately.
However when a person becomes a born-again believer and is forgiven of
all their sins, past, present, and future, that changes things as it did for me
in 1974. I happened to see her as I
requested and got to share the plan of salvation with her, and was to see her
again, but death came first. We had a
daughter together and so I, and my family desired to support her through this
difficult time in her life as her adopted father had died in 2018 and so she
was left without either, and I know that this was tough on her. As I look at this introduction into these
verses it becomes painfully true to me what death brings, and as I continue to
look at Matthew’s gospel I am seeing why he puts things in the order that he
puts them as he is writing about the King and His Kingdom. Death will not be as prevalent in the Kingdom
Age of Jesus Christ and Matthew wants us to realize this and that is probably
why he is showing in a gradual way what Jesus Christ has power over, and as we
see in this section that Matthew shows to us that He has power even over
death.
I
will close this first SD on the intro to these verses by talking about what is
found in John chapter eleven, a chapter that is about Jesus also raising one
from the dead, and this time he had been dead for four days. In that chapter Jesus raises Lazarus from the
dead and we learn also from that section another of Jesus “"I am the
resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me will live even if he dies.” Yes Jesus has the power over death and even
when a believer dies they will be immediately in the present of the Lord as
Paul states that “absent from the body is present with the Lord.”
Lord
willing we will continue with this intro in our next SD.
5/27/2021 11:00 AM
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